On Monday, the Saucon Valley School District and its teachers union went before Pennsylvania Labor Relations Hearing Officer Jack Marino over charges by district that the union was engaging in regressive bargaining.

On Monday, the Saucon Valley School District and its teachers union went before Pennsylvania Labor Relations Hearing Officer Jack Marino over charges by district that the union was engaging in regressive bargaining. (MORNING CALL FILE PHOTO)

State says this school district and its teachers union are like “a bad marriage”

For more than four hours, Pennsylvania Labor Relations hearing officer Jack Marino heard attorneys representing the Saucon Valley School District and the teachers union take jabs at each other and point the finger at the other as the reason why they were all there.

"It's like a bad marriage except you can't divorce," he said of the relationship between the district and the Saucon Valley Education Association. "It's funny except to you without a contract."

On Monday, the two sides went before Marino in another phase of the nearly three-year contract impasse. The district filed charges against the union in June, saying it was engaging in regressive bargaining.

Union attorney Andrew Muir alleged the two sides were there as part of a public relations stunt by the district.

Marino questioned if going to the state Labor Relations Board was worthwhile. Instead, he said, the union and district should be heading back to the bargaining table to reach a deal for the 180 teachers in the district.

"What we're doing today is not going to get things moving," he said."Just get this done."

Marino heard testimony from the district's business manager, David Bonenberger, who outlined contract proposals from the past year, starting with a third-party fact-finder's report from October 2013.

The school board approved that report, but the union rejected it twice. The union has since proposed several other deals that include raises from 2 to 3 percent each year, plus step and column movement. The district refuses to approve any of those deals and instead wants to work around the fact-finder's report, which the union refuses to do.

The district did offer a six-year proposal that largely reflects the fact-finder's report with two years of retroactive salary freezes. That deal brought starting salary to $49,000 and top salary to $96,000 in the final years. The union has long argued Saucon Valley teachers starting out in their careers are not paid as well as by other districts.

The district argues the union's refusal to work with the fact-finder's report and the complete reorganization of its negotiations team in the spring, including hiring Muir, points to its regressive bargaining.

If the district is victorious in its claims, it wants the state to direct the union to submit a proposal consistent with the union's position before October 2013.

In his testimony, Bonenberger described how much some teachers would make under each proposal.

He said that under the fact-finder's report, union President Theresa Andreucci, who currently makes $66,343, would make $71,409 in the final year of the four-year contract.

Union chief negotiator Rich Simononis, who currently makes $93,072, would not see a change in his salary — except for a $1,500 stipend one year — under the fact-finder's report because he is at the top of the pay scale.

But according to Bonenberger, under the union's August contract proposal, Andreucci would see her salary go to nearly $90,000 and Simononis to more than $110,000.

Muir said those numbers weren't accurate or relevant to the case being made by the district.

"This is in part a work of fiction," he said.

The district also said Monday that since forming a new negotiations team, the union has refused to discuss any issues except salary. The district also wants teachers to pay more toward health care, but the union wants contributions to remain as they are.

"If we had a simple solution, we wouldn't have taken this route," district solicitor Jeff Sultanik said, explaining why the district filed the unfair labor charges. "We're doing this out of desperation."

The only other testimony Monday came from Andreucci, who was the union's witness. Andreucci, who has been union president since May 2013, mostly described how a new negotiations team was formed after the union rejected a tentative agreement in January.

Muir said a few times Monday he did not agree with the district's allegations of the union practicing unfair bargaining and it was not worth it being in Harrisburg.

"We should just be directed to resume bargaining right away," he said.

Contract negotiations have a history of being contentious in Saucon Valley. Teachers previously hit the picket lines in 2005, 2008 and 2009.